


Midnight Cab Rides to You

by QueenKatelynTheAristocrat



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 2009 Era (Phandom), Adorable, Angst and Feels, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Best Friends, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Feels, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Hopeful Ending, M/M, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-06
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-11-26 09:15:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20927789
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenKatelynTheAristocrat/pseuds/QueenKatelynTheAristocrat
Summary: "Whenever he felt the spiralling of his thoughts that indicated an impending breakdown, there was only ever one place he would go.He wondered how many breakdowns he had left before Phil got sick of him."Also known as: Dan can't stand another damn minute on campus, so he does the only thing he can think of to make himself feel like he isn't dying. He gets a cab to Phil's flat.





	Midnight Cab Rides to You

To Dan Howell, midnight was like a fucking heart attack. Misery building upon misery and loneliness building upon loneliness until it felt like he was going to die if he sat in this room for one minute longer, and -- 

Yeah, he had to get out of here. 

He picked up his phone, his wallet, and his jacket and walked out the door with a slam and without a single glance of acknowledgement at his roommate. Not that his roommate gave a fuck what he did anyway. They weren’t friends. 

Dan was pretty sure he only had one friend. But that one friend was so great that Dan would choose him over a million friends anyday. 

In fact, Dan couldn’t think of anywhere better to go than that very friend’s flat. It might be on the other goddamn side of the city, but it was already past midnight, so what did it fucking matter how late it was? He wasn’t going to sleep. 

As Dan called a cab and gave Phil Lester’s address, he felt a bit guilty. Phil probably _ was _ sleeping. Like any normal person would be. Not that Phil was normal. Dan would never call his best friend anything as insulting as _ normal. _

Regardless, Dan got in the cab. There was never any chance of him _ not _getting in the cab. Whenever he felt the spiralling of his thoughts that indicated an impending breakdown, there was only ever one place he would go. 

He wondered how many breakdowns he had left before Phil got sick of him.

No, he wouldn’t think like that. They were going to live together. Phil had said so, last time Dan saw him, which was only a week and a half ago. It was fucking Wednesday, for gods sake, it’s not like everything could have changed in only that long. 

He tried to tell himself this was only his brain trying to fuck him over. His brain always tried to convince him of horrible things when he got like this. Phil called it PTSD, but Dan wouldn’t take it _ that _far. 

Sure, he had some shit, but it wasn’t as bad as some other people’s shit. 

Phil always said they weren’t talking about other people’s shit. 

Dan wished this goddamn cab would go a bit faster so Phil could say comforting things like that to him in person. Phil always knew how to make him feel better, even when Dan didn’t know what was wrong in the first place. 

In fact, he didn’t even know what the Hell was wrong with him _ tonight. _ It wasn’t like anything had _ happened. _ He’d just had a long day of class and he had two essays due by Friday and sometimes campus felt so small that he got claustrophobic just walking around it and he _ knew _people around here weren’t like the guys from his secondary school, but that didn’t matter cause every time someone looked at him funny on the street he tensed up, and -- 

No, no, no. He was alright. He was not going to panic. He was nearly halfway to Phil’s flat already, and once he got there everything would be better, because Phil would open the door and Dan would immediately be enveloped in his familiar, comforting scent, and he would get that “home” feeling he never got anywhere else. 

Sometimes it felt like he spent his every waking moment counting down the days until they could live together for real. Until he could truly call the place where Phil lived his home. 

Maybe one day, when this Youtube thing took off, he wouldn’t even have to _ leave. _They could just live together in their little bubble of peace, the rest of the world be damned. 

And maybe his Mom would stop asking if he was alright. Or he could at least give the phone to Phil when she did so he could explain that, “Dan is just fine, Mrs. Howell, really. You don’t have to worry.” 

Dan wondered where all this goddamn worry had been when he was a kid. 

The cab came to a stop at a traffic light, and Dan had to take a deep breath to keep from fidgeting. He supposed he should probably call Phil to let him know he was coming, but he was also kind of afraid that he wouldn’t answer the phone. 

But he supposed it was better for him not to answer the phone than not answer the _ door _when Dan showed up with no warning whatsoever. 

He dialed Phil’s number. 

Dan could feel his heart beating in his stomach while he waited. It was a special kind of panic that was caused by the sound of the phone ringing on the other line. The uncertainty of when and whether the other person would answer, the knowledge that phones didn’t allow any posturing, the simple fact that speaking to someone when you couldn’t see their face was so fucking anxiety inducing. 

Thankfully, Phil didn’t leave him waiting. He answered on the second ring, and Dan could tell from his voice that he’d woken him up, but he didn’t really have it in him to feel as guilty as he should. 

“Dan?” Phil’s newly awoken voice jolted him out of his misery. There was something about the way Phil said his name, the tone of voice that was undeniably _ his _that made Dan calmer than he ever remembered being. 

“Dan, are you there?” Phil asked, sounding like he’d much rather be asleep. 

“Yeah, I’m here.” Dan answered, before Phil decided to just hang up. 

There was silence for a second. Then, “What’s wrong?” 

How did he just _ know? _

Was it some sort of best friend telepathy? That worked across great distances like a radio signal? Or could anyone Dan talked to tell just how much he was panicking on the inside? 

He was suddenly glad he hadn’t spoken to his roommate when he’d walked out earlier. 

“I’m in a cab.” Dan blurted, unable to think of a way to describe what exactly _ was _wrong, and deciding to evade that subject for now. 

“You’re in a cab?” Phil asked, suddenly sounding much more awake, “Dan, it’s 12:34 at _ night _.” 

“Or in the morning, depending how you think about it.” Dan answered. 

“Stop trying to distract me. Where are you going?” Phil asked, even more concerned than Dan had expected. Not that Dan had the mental energy to expect much of anything in his current state. 

“I’m coming over. If that’s ok?” Dan held his breath. He didn’t know what the fuck he was going to do if Phil said no, especially since he was only a few minutes away at this point. 

Dan could hear the rustling of sheets and the sound of footsteps as Phil got out of bed and -- presumably -- walked to the main room of the apartment. “Of course that’s ok, but why? What’s wrong?” he asked again. 

Damn, he wasn’t going to be averted. Dan wasn’t sure he’d be able to explain it, especially now over the goddamn phone. Maybe not even when they were face to face, sitting at the kitchen table, or maybe even lying side by side in Phil’s bed. 

Not that Dan was expecting anything. He never knew what he was allowed to expect. 

“I don’t know. It just… I just wanted to see you.” Dan answered, knowing that this, at least, was true. Even if he didn’t know what else was. 

There was another pause. “Well, you’ll see me soon enough, I expect. Since you’re already in the cab.” 

Dan could hear the worry in his voice, but he was glad Phil was going to let him leave it for now. “Yeah, it’s not like I could get this guy to turn around in this kind of traffic. So I’m coming to your doorstep whether or not you let me in.” 

Dan could hear the smile in Phil’s voice as he responded, “Not that I have a doorstep. But I appreciate the sentiment.” 

“Your _ building _has a doorstep.” Dan argued. 

“Does it?” Phil asked, sounding genuinely intrigued. 

“Yes, idiot.” 

“Well, you learn something new every day.” Phil joked. 

“See you in literally a minute.” Dan said, preparing to hang up the phone. 

“I’ll be waiting.” Phil said, then hung up before Dan had the chance to. 

That feeling of existential panic returned the moment he dropped the phone back down to the seat beside him, but that was almost alright, because he knew Phil’s presence was even better for chasing away the doubts than his voice was. Otherwise he would’ve just called him from the spot outside his dorm where people went to get high. 

Not that Dan had the kind of self control necessary to prevent himself from just turning up at Phil’s apartment whenever he started to feel lonely again. He remembered a version of himself who would have hated being so dependent on another person. Who would have been terrified by the very prospect of needing someone, because everyone he’d ever trusted had let him down. 

Everyone, that is, except Phil fucking Lester. 

When Dan got out of the cab it was raining. He couldn’t remember if it had been raining when he left the University or not. He figured that might be a problem, but he couldn’t be arsed to care. 

The trip through the lobby and up the stairs to Phil’s flat was a blur. Dan had made the journey what felt like a million times, and yet he couldn’t have said what color the wallpaper in the hallways was or whether the doors were made of wood or metal. Every time he’d gone through them the only thing on his mind had been his destination. 

And when he reached that destination, the effect was immediate. If he’d believed in God he would have called it a miracle. The second he knocked on the door it opened, and suddenly he was staring into eyes as blue and calming as the ocean or the Summer sky just before the sun started to set, and he was enveloped in arms that felt like happiness and smelled like home and the rest of the world could dissolve into nothing for all he cared. 

Dan might not have believed in God, and he wasn’t sure he believed in Soulmates, but he sure as Hell believed in Phil Lester. 

Dan buried his face in Phil’s neck and inhaled. He was still astounded, every single time, by how quickly his tense muscles relaxed and the weight he hadn’t even realized he was carrying dropped from his shoulders -- along with his jacket -- onto the floor of Phil’s flat. 

He vaguely remembered Phil grabbing his wrists gently and leading him further inside and closing the door behind him, and before he knew it he was sitting on the only bit of space left open on the counter of Phil’s ridiculously tiny kitchen while Phil made tea. Neither of them had spoken a single word aloud so far, but Dan didn’t mind. This wasn’t the kind of silence that suffocated, it was the kind that felt like a warm blanket wrapped around his shoulders: it was comforting and familiar, and it meant that neither of them felt the need to fill the empty space with empty words. 

Then, he was sitting on Phil’s bed with a cup of tea and a real blanket, and Phil was sitting beside him eyeing him with concern. “I hate seeing you like this.” Phil said, gently. 

Dan met his worried eyes and smiled, “If you think this is bad, you should see me before I get here.” 

That made Phil’s eyebrows scrunch together in the kind of genuine concern that Dan still wasn’t used to, and he said, “Can you try to tell me what makes you so sad?” 

And God, how those steady blue eyes made Dan wish he could. “Trust me, I would tell you if I knew it myself.” 

Really, Phil’s eyes weren’t just blue. They also had flecks of gold and green mixed in, like the surface of some mystical planet that Dan was seeing from way out in space. If he could, he would land a spaceship there and spend the rest of his life exploring. It was probably a much happier place there than inside Dan’s head. 

“If we don’t know the cause of it, how do we make it go away?” Phil asked, and it was such a goddamn innocent statement that if anyone else had made it Dan would be incredibly annoyed. 

But Jesus Fucking Christ the way Amazing Phil Lester said “We.” 

“We don’t really.” Dan said, looking away as he grabbed Phil’s hand and laced their fingers together, “All we can do is cover it up for a while.” 

“Well, how do we do that?” He could tell Phil was looking at him, could feel those eyes on his skin, but he didn’t dare look up. 

“Don’t worry. You already have.” Dan answered, and fucking Hell, it was true. 

“How could I have? I haven’t done anything?” he sounded confused now, and Dan just had to look up. He couldn’t resist anymore. 

“You don’t have to do anything. You’re you.” Dan answered, honest and warm. 

Phil’s lips were on his before he even knew what was happening. It was a few seconds before Dan realized he was still holding a cup of hot tea, and he untangled his other hand from Phils, and put it against his chest and pushed gently. 

Phil pulled back and looked at him in concern, as if he thought Dan was pushing him away because he didn’t _ want _to kiss him. Dan raised an eyebrow and said, “Tea, idiot.” 

Phil blushed and looked away. “Oh, yeah.” 

Dan put the tea down on the bedside table, and moved closer to his best friend -- his best friend who might possibly be becoming something more -- and reached out to push his hair out of his eyes. 

Phil looked back at him, eyes carefully blank, as if still unsure of Dan’s reaction. 

“Tea which I am no longer holding. See? Aren’t you glad I made you buy that table?” Dan said, then summoned all the courage he possessed and leaned in. The last thing he saw before he closed his eyes was Phil’s expression of absolute wonder. 

It was nearly an hour later, and they were lying side by side, legs tangled together and a blanket thrown over them both, and Phil was running his fingers through Dan’s hair, which was starting to re-curl as it dried from the rain he’d apparently walked through earlier. 

“I don’t want to go back.” Dan whispered, because these things were always easier to say in the dark. 

“I know. I must admit, I’m still not sure why you do. Since you hate it so much.” Phil answered, and Dan could feel somehow that he understood. 

“I have to make something of myself. Prove them wrong, and all that.” Dan said.

_ “Something _ doesn’t have to be a _ lawyer.” _he said, and fuck in Phil’s calm tone it made even more sense than usual. 

“It’s gotta be something that makes a lot of money, though. Cause I can’t ask them for help. I _ won’t _ ask them for help.” Dan said, a little nervous because this was stepping closer and closer to that _ thing _that he and Phil only talked about at this time of night. Then they would get to the part where Phil said he’d been abused and Dan said that abuse was something much worse than what his childhood had been, and Phil always let it go, even though he clearly didn’t agree. 

To Dan’s surprise, that’s not where the conversation went. 

Instead, Phil just said, “One day, we won’t need anyone’s help. We’ll move to London and I’ll get a dozen houseplants and you can buy those shirts you like that cost 500 pounds, and we’ll pay our rent with money from our AdSense.” 

Dan smiled. He much preferred talk of the future to a rehashing of his past. “And we can spend the entire day playing video games and watching TV, and when my mom calls I can give the phone to you so I don’t have to deal with it?” 

“Yes. Everyday will be a weekend.” Phil said. 

“You promise?” Dan asked, and it sounded so much more vulnerable than he’d wanted it to. 

“I promise.” Phil replied, the kind of steady that matched perfectly. 

“Then you’d better get a lot more famous, Mr. Amazing.” Dan teased.

Phil pulled back just far enough to look into his eyes. What Dan saw in Phil’s nearly stopped his heart. “If anyone here is going to be famous, it’s you, Dan Howell.” 

Dan had to break eye contact. If he didn’t, he thought he might explode. “I won’t.” 

“You will.” Phil said, immediately, “You relate to people in a way I’ll never be able to. There’s something about your words that makes people want to listen to them.” 

Dan wished he had as much confidence in himself as Phil did. “Yeah, but you’re kind. And nice. And honest. All things I’ll never be.” 

“I disagree. But thank you.” Phil answered, softly. 

“Tell me more about our flat in London.” Dan asked, so quietly he half expected Phil wouldn’t hear it. 

But, of course, he heard. And so he did. And Dan fell asleep to dreams of delivery pizza and Christmas lights, gaming rooms and Halloween decorations. Two bedrooms that they took turns sleeping together in and one of those plaques from YouTube with both their names on it. 

And when he woke up the next morning, late for the Poli Sci class he didn’t give a shit about and filled with the deep pain of reality, he couldn’t even manage to be too upset about it. 

After all, with that kind of future to look forward to, how could he be?

**Author's Note:**

> Kudos and Comments make my day! <3


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